The present day LANs span wide areas and are interconnected through wide area Ethernet (a registered trademark) protocol. SNMP has been standardized for the management of the network and the numerous constituent network elements. Configuration management is one aspect of network management. One example of a network is a LAN. Configuration management involves automatic detection of elements in the network, automated generation of the network map with information on the interconnection of the network elements and display of the map along with the status of each network element on a console enabling the human manager or network operator to intuitively grasp the status of the network and the constituent elements and thereby facilitates network operation and management.